SaintAngerBH wrote:Can someone remind me again why Vegas is the best team in the west? I don't know why, but that really gets on my nerves. They are supposed to suck and I hope they get swept in the first round (unlikely).

They have benefited at home from facing a bunch of teams who played the night before, teams taking them lightly as they're a expansion team. Overall they aren't that great of a team. The teams weakness will be exposed in the playoffs.

The "new" rules don't help. Since the goaltender can't play the puck in the corners, defensemen get plowed by the forechecker routinely into the boards. The game is so damn fast now that I have to think that game speed is also an issue here. The speed with which players collide now is frightening. I also agree with the notion that the shoulder pads and elbow pads should be scaled back down to how they were 20-30 years ago. Now, they are just weapons.

~Marriage is like putting your hand into a bag of snakes in the hope of pulling out an eel.

I have to correct what was said at 6:17 or so of that video (I am a biochemist and have studied this to some degree). Neuronal damage is not permanent. There is such a thing as neurogenesis and it does contribute significantly to the replacement of dead neurons. But, it is relatively slow and the neurogenesis process itself can be interrupted by trauma (as is seen with neurodegenerative disorders like Alzheimer's).

~Marriage is like putting your hand into a bag of snakes in the hope of pulling out an eel.

I got a ranch in downtown Dallas/I buy diamonds by the ton/Chase cuties in my Cadillac/Drill oil wells just for fun/But when it comes to boots, I need a deal/That will fit me right, toe to heel/So I get my boots at Western Warehouse.

And he did it going up against real goaltending, teams preparing for opponents via advanced scouting, and rosters four lines deep full of guys who can skate. Imagine him playing back in the 80s where goaltending was non-existent, where opposing coaches often had no useful knowledge of what it is your team liked to do, and when every team had a couple of guys who couldn’t play but were there to fight.

I got a ranch in downtown Dallas/I buy diamonds by the ton/Chase cuties in my Cadillac/Drill oil wells just for fun/But when it comes to boots, I need a deal/That will fit me right, toe to heel/So I get my boots at Western Warehouse.

Troy McClure wrote:And he did it going up against real goaltending, teams preparing for opponents via advanced scouting, and rosters four lines deep full of guys who can skate. Imagine him playing back in the 80s where goaltending was non-existent, where opposing coaches often had no useful knowledge of what it is your team liked to do, and when every team had a couple of guys who couldn’t play but were there to fight.

Yup. Also this is the same league where a scrub like Fleury can get to 400 wins, so maybe the game isn't harder these days.